Howards Mountain Lodge

Lodge

We were taking 2 beds in 3people dormitory, 1 bed left empty, so it was a good deal 4 stars because the kitchen is quite small.

Rooms were nice, warm and comforting. Beds a little small but other then that great place overall for price. Good price for the rooms highly recommend. Will be coming back next season.

Nice and cosy place, very convenient location. The staff are friendly and helpful.

Convenient location. Clean facilities. Stayed in a double bed room across from the washrooms so was a little noisy when people went to use it and do not close the door. The room itself was fairly small, but large enough to still store some bags against the walls.

Smells like damp all year round. Rooms are private enough but not too much space for your belongs. Kitchen is big enough but has no washing up liquid to wash up with. Ok for a night passing though.

Very friendly and helpful staff. Easy bookings, and easy pick ups for the crossing. Great 'paid for' breakfasts but fantantastic, and well worth the price. 3 days there and it was all good.

Pros Staff was nice and we could use the storage facility for our luggage. Good location but bare in mind that if an accident happens on the highway there is a very long drive around the mountain to get to the national park. Clean room. We had a shower and toilet in our room which came in handy. Shower working fine. Kitchen wasnt very utilised by people, which was good as we didn't have to wait our turn to use the kitchen facilities. Cons Bed matress is bad quality. Wi-Fi does not work at all. No free salt, pepper or oil in the kitchen. The food sticks to the pots and are very difficult to clean. Although they say the rooms are sound proof, you can still hear the backpackers music and chats, or the neighbours smashing their doors in the morning.

Awesome place! I arrived on my bike cold and wet and for only 2 dollars more than camping in the area, I got a dorm room, clean shower, hot tub, drying room for all my gear, cool lounge area… really good place! Also all of the staff were really friendly and cool!

Clean dorms, incredibly warm and friendly staff. Staff responded to my questions via email in a timely fashion and helped me book everything I needed for the tongariro alpine crossing hike. Great place to stay for that hike!

Easy and cheap accommodation. The staff, or at least the lady in reception, are friendly and engaging. I only managed to get the Wi-Fi working once, standing in the reception area, and then it was a pfaff. Rooms are a bit noisy but the beds are comfortable. Really good kitchen facilities.

Had an amazing stay here! Everything was clean and comfortable, loved all the stoves and wood burning fires, the perfect place to chill in the evenings. Margi and her partner were super helpful lending us hats and water bottles for our hike and helping us when we were stuck :)

Excellent accommodation with incredibly friendly and helpful staff. Facilities are great with huge lounge with pool table and wood fire or spa for after the mountains. Best place we've stayed in national park!

Really great hostel. Has a direct shuttle to and from the alpine crossing (although does cost $40), rooms are great and the fires are usually always lit which keeps the place nice and cosy. Would recommend!

We found this a lovely base for our Tongariro Crossing, with the owner very helpful and the spa hot tub in particular a real treat after we returned from the hike. The rooms may be very basic and not as spacious as other lodges in the area, but the lounge and kitchen facilities more than make up for that. The optional breakfast (cereal, peaches, toast, eggs and tea/coffee/orange juice) before departing for the hike is also a welcome touch. If my review and photos were helpful to you, please give me a thumbs up Thanks!

The owner was the rudest person ive ever come across. The receptionist was really nice. But the owner made me feel unwelcomed and was a big downer on the overall trip. Only 100mb of data. Hot water ran out multiple times leaving our ski gear soaked overnight in what they call a drying room. Stingy asf. Everything had strings attached to money. I didnt use a credit card but noticed a 2% charge for the use of one. They charge $2 to play pool. You cant change the temperature on your room heater. The fire had a welded air intake lever so it only burned one log a night so it did nothing. The spa was empty. Te microwave was at least 20 tears old and didnt work at all. The beds would fit a child. Not happy at all.

$360 dollars for a double room for 2 nights stay… the hot water ran out and was forced to have a cold shower. Heaters in room are locked and set to a thermostat you can't control. Bins in the communal kitchen were on the brink of overflowing from food that was in them for more than a whole day. Kitchen equipment not up to standard for anyone to use — may as well go camping and pay a 10th of the price.

The spa was empty and the pool table is pay per play. The Wi-Fi is limited and the pillows awful. But very friendly staff and good location.

Great atmosphere. Good location. Amazing front desk staff. Very clean room… only downside was the TV reception.

Warning! Warning! Warning Worst coustomer services ever encounter in my hotel stays and I travel a lot, not recommended for any one they take advantage of coustomer is a problem and try to make more money off, zero coustomer satisfaction, zero helpful staff, zero human values, people coustomer in a problem is an other way for them to make money off, cold rooms in freezing temperatures, dirty kitchen, room service near to non existent, random power failours, bad in internet chargeable more then 100 mb, unhealthy common room, almost zero optimizable facility for coustomer not recommended for any one, rest your choice I had horrible experience.

My main complaint about this lodge is the hot water system. The hot water system is used to heat the rooms, drying rooms, and showers. They have placed a timer on the hot water so it cuts off leading to freezing cold showers, wet gear, and cold rooms in the middle of winter. Other than this there is a distinct lack of fire alarms. Some positives is the communal areas which are very homely.

We have stayed with our group in 12 people lodge. Really comfortable place. Bad that Wi-Fi signal was weak out there. Kitchen fully equipped. Bedrooms pretty small but we didn't spend to much time in there. Huge living area. Coming again in march.

The rooms are basic but the beds are very comfy. Free Wi-Fi is only 100mb so dosnt last long! Breakfast is simple but nice. Toast eggs cereal meat and cheese. Free shuttle on weekdays only. So if you are doing the crossing place is great.

Do not reserve or stay here! the new owner g. ADAMS IS STINGY and insists on charging a 15% cancellation fee on a family booking over TWO months in advance. There are much nicer accomodations at tongariro national park village!

One of the best hostels I've ever stayed in, perhaps because it was off-season. It was very quiet and clean with spacious cosy communal areas. Kitchens well supplied and the owner was friendly and helpful, if a little idiosyncratic at first.

Great location for the Tongariro crossing. Lodge offers free transport. Clean and basic rooms. Stayed in a double room with ensuite. Friendly and helpful reception.

I have stayed at Howards maybe 8 times now. Went last month with work social club to walk the crossing. Place was spotless as ever and Hosts were very helpful co-ordinating our group. Very patient with various peoples needs and great time was had by all. Huge hot plate BBQ especially good for our team. Plans already afoot for next year. No hesitation in recommending this place.

Had a very nice time. Weather wasn't very good but staff had some good suggestions for alternative things to do. Very clean and good value for the price.

Very nice place, spacious and very clean.
We took the package 2 nights + breakfast + lunch box + travel round-trip to the tongariro crossing
The lunch box was composed of 2 sandwiches the bread set + 2-3 bars of cereal and chocolate + 1 Apple + a bottle per person.
Very good advice at the reception for the crossing that one could not do because of the weather but the person facing us an another hike. Fortunately, because a tongariro there was lots of wind, cloud and it was cold. We could see a few Lakes and waterfall to make up for the disappointment of not making the crossing.

Clean and tidy, so good in that respect. Problems are with management and the owner. These people can not be relied on to give correct advice about anything and are completely focused on making money for themselves (to your detriment). I have stayed twice in the last year, both times have had problems with the owner and staff, so despite the nice environment I would not stay there again.

Don't write a review on yourself and rate 5 starts! I have been to the lodge several times in the past ten years, it was "very good" until the owner changed several years ago.

Stayed over 2 nights while we did the crossing. We drove down from Auckland after work on Friday so didn’t arrive until after the office had closed, but this was not a problem as they called to confirm about 7pm, told us what room we were in and left the room unlocked for us. When we arrived, we promptly locked the keys in the room and after reading some of the previous reviews I was apprehensive knocking on the office door after hours, but the lady was very polite, saw the funny side of the situation and happily gave me a 2nd key. Breakfast was a good solid continental breakfast; it would have been nice to have the option to pay for a hot breakfast considering the amount of walking we were planning for the day. The packed lunch was great and good quality as well. The bus driver and bus were really helpful and fun. All in all, the Howard lodge is great value for money and I wouldn’t hesitate in recommending it to friends.